DoDFire

Still playing, and I need to learn how to control that needle and paint flow better. I got a little heavy on the blue on he till plate but I don't think the fish will care when it's crash'n through a brush pile.

Bucktail will work, you need to "hand select" the tails. Bucktails are all different, some have large coarse fibers and some have fine subtle fibers. I hand select all my bucktail for tie'n jigs and try to get the finest fibers I can. I bet that tail you have now has some of the finer fibers towards the tip of the tail. It looks like you cut the hair towards the base of the tail for your hook in the pic. I very rarely tie with those big hollow coarse hairs and they can be a pain in the butt to work with when you put pressure on the thread to tighten the hair down on a hook, they flare out like an umbrella. Find that thinner hair on the tip of the tail and cut it at the hide, pick out (clean up) the loose hair and even up the hair tips and your in biz-niz. Your better hair to tie with usually comes from the tip to midsection of the tail. Hope this helps you out.

If your going to fish it under a bobber in winter it may have to much action. There is a little trick done to the float and fly rig (if you don't already know) with "fish dope" in the winter. I know on my drop shot hair flies (craft hair) during winter the fish won't touch it unless we have the hair slicked down with fish dope or KVD fish sticks. It does make a difference and I proved that to a guy I fished with a few years ago. When he seen what was going on and slicked the hair down he started catching fish and 2 weeks later he sent me a pic of a smallmouth he caught while drop shotting one of my flies and he sure had a big smile on his face. I would have been smile'n like a pimp as well if I caught a 6# smallmouth. If your not already aware, fish dope or KVD fish sticks come in a tube like chapstix and you just rub a small bit between your thumb and finger then you take the jig\fly and run it between your thumb\finger and smear it on the jig in a light coat, this deadens the action. Once your done and home you can wash it out of the fibers with dawn soap and hang to dry then you have the action back if you want to use later in the year. Not sure you could wash it out of the marabou without destroying the fibers. I'll hush now, just thought I'd pass that along. It took me a couple of winters to figure out I needed the goop on my hair flies to get bit. I figured I was doing the same thing as the FnF guys by putting a hair jig/fly in their face except I wasn't using a float and I wasn't catch'n fish..

All the right colors. My favorites. The action will be killer I promise you that. Have you ever tried that jig without the weedguard? I bet you get more action if it was eliminated but of course it all depends if you can get away with eliminating it. That is one good look'n vib jig I know that. I'm no help there, I don't even own a cell phone. 2017 and no cell phone, guess I'm the odd ball.

Thanks guys, I have never done drugs, but painting these I feel like a crack addict, I can't stop mess'n with this stuff. I have to be honest, I enjoy painting way more than tie'n jigs and I love to tie a jig in case you didn't know..... I have no clue what I'm going to paint when I sit down, I just start blending paints one drop at a time on a sheet of paper to experiment and see how the different paints blend and what color I get, then I shoot a color when it looks good to me, I guess that's what I like the most. I never know what I have till it's done, if I don't like it I clean it off and shoot it again. I'll get my colors down to what works around here when I stop playing around. I still have a dozen blanks to play around with then I'm out. I'll be researching more on where to buy the better blanks and go from there. Anyways......I talk/type to much. Here is what I ended up with tonight. Bone with chartreuse/orange on belly, black transparent over blue pearl on top (that you can't see in pic)

Looks good to me, if I was a smallmouth I'd eat it. You sling'n that on a fly rod or spinning gear?

I lied.......More pics. Sorry, I got the bug bad.

All right, last pics for awhile.

Alright, it's 5 am and time for bed........See what a silly chunk of plastic and paint has started, I'm hooked. Shad pattern before epoxy, I'll add better pics later this tablet camera sucks.

If you have bluff walls where a creek/river channel swings into the bluff check that area out real good, also the ends of a bluff where it tapers out. If you have any banks where there is chunk rock and gravel mixed look in that area. Look for transitions where the rocks change size or where a vein of rocks might meet the gravel. The isolated rock piles where nothing else is around need to be looked at as well. If you can find a cove or pocket with bait fish loaded in it that always makes for a fun day. I fished a few days ago and had to go 3/4 the way back in the coves to get bit, the fish weren't 1/4 ways in or 1/2 way in or all the way in the back, it was 3/4 and that was every cove or pocket I hit. Once I figured that out I just went 3/4's in and dropped the trolling motor. A big plus or the key ingredient for all the things I mentioned is have'n deeper water near by. Don't forget to check some shallow stuff, you would be surprised sometimes where the smallmouth go in the winter. I promise you, you don't need electronics to catch fish. I fished out of a 16' flat bottom for 5 years before I bought my Bullet and I think I caught more fish out of it than my bass boat. Most of the time the fish are hugging bottom this time of year and you won't see them on a screen. I also give another vote for the hair jig in 1\8 oz. and a blade bait, that is pretty much all I have in my boat during winter. I start sling'n and drag'n my 1\8 oz. hair jigs when the surface temps hit 55° and dropping. What ever you have rigged up needs to be fished slow this time of year. One last thing, since you don't have electronics you might want to check out some type of satellite image online of the waters you fish, this might help you see the creek/river channels and how the terrain is on your body of water. I look at the 2 lakes I fish all the time just to get an idea of what it looks like. I can zoom way in and it shows the lakes around here at winter stage and I can pick out a few things that catch my interest. Sorry for rambling on, I just love smallmouth and winter and talking about both. Hope this was some kind of help.

Good look'n girls right there. Love the colors.

Here is the first one I have ever painted, lots to learn and a whole bunch of practice to come....I was trying to get comfortable with the air pressure/paint flow and using a couple of stencils and this was the results. Surely I can get at least one fish to eat this thing. I'll take better pics one day, the phone pics are nasty. I do want to Thank you guys that have shared info with me so Thank You very much, I do appreciate the help.

Not your typical Preacher Jig but I like to show them something different. 6-7 inches long and 1 oz. This thing looks like a big shad gliding to the bottom. It glides and doesn't drop like a rock. This thing is sexy nasty look'n in the water. It's double tied with bucktail meaning I tie hair in both spots of the jig collar, you have a spot on jig heads where you tie the material or band a skirt then there is a spot behind that and I tie there as well. I tie the hackle straight on the hook shank and apply a thin coat of super glue over the thread. If you have a shop near you that sells bucktail it's best to hand select the tails and hackle vs ordering online. If you deer hunt or have buddies/family that hunt that would be a good source as well or maybe a processing business where folks take their deer. If you go that route then you have to go through the whole process of getting the bone out and curing the hide along with washing the hair. It has saved me a bunch of $$ and I don't mind doing it when I get the tails for free, plus it adds to the handcrafted labor of love.

Best day I ever had for "big" smallmouth was on Norris lake, it never got above 16° with a surface temp of 45°. I put 24 smallmouth in the boat and most were in the 4 pound range. I was actually in the water before the sun came up (stupid or obsessed, not sure) I caught fish from daylight till an hour before dark.It's funny you mention the shade because 90℅ of the fish I caught that day were on the bluff walls where the sun never hits this time if year.It was cold but the smallmouth fish'n was hot in my opinion. I haven't had a day like that since on Norris, but I sure hope it happens again.

80# test Berkley Steelon Nylon-Coated Wire......This wire has the perfect tension after it is cured in the oven during the powder paint cure process. I have tested all # test with the Steelon and 80# is perfect. On a side note, I pour the heads with the wire guard in the mold, no drilling and gluing the wire in place like a few folks have done. Drilling a lead head is dangerous and will run a drill bit through a finger real quick if you are not using a vise You can pour any weedless head using wire as long as you have teflon base hole pin. I cut my pins 1\2" in length and I use scotch tape to secure the pin into the mold, just lay the tip of the pin where it is flush with the head. The scotch tape works well and believe it or not the heat doesn't mess with it, sometimes you may need to use a fresh piece but not often. I cut the wire the same length as a traditional nylon weed guard and lay it into the mold then close it up and pour that's it. A little trick though on the nylon coated wire......You need to melt about 1\4" of the nylon from the tip before it goes into the mold. I place the 2 wires together and I hold the wire against the pour spout on the lead pot, melt 1\4" or so then lay it in the mold to pour. If you pour a head and the nylon coating was not melted prior you will get an incomplete pour and when you break or cut the sprue off you will notice an open cavity inside the head, happens everytime. I can post pics if need be. Hope this helps.